The New Google Earth

 

With the new release of Google Earth learning about our planet has become a lot more interesting and fun too. The program is a free web-based application that creates a virtual Earth from satellite pictures of every part of the globe. Users can zoom in on city blocks, rainforests or even motorways. The first version of Google Earth was released in 2005. In the past years it has been downloaded about 500 million times.

In earlier versions of the software users were only able to view the surface of our planet. Water was seen upon as only a dull blue surface. Google Earth 5.0 changes that.

During two years of hard work Google’s developers have improved the program. Now it is possible to explore the oceans and the sky. It even includes a globe of the planet Mars. The company has also added other content like videos, photos and audio clips.

The content covers a wide range of topics. If you click on Hawaii, for example, you cannot only see satellite images of the islands but also learn about humpback whales. Clicking on a part of the Atlantic Ocean will bring forth images and videos of sunken ships like the Titanic.

 

 

With this content Google wants to show us how important it is to understand the world’s ocean and how we are connected with them.

 

 

 

 

Words

  • application = computer program
  • bring forth = show
  • connect = link
  • developer = a person who works on making something better
  • dull = uninteresting, boring
  • explore = to travel around a place so that you can find out more about it
  • globe = world
  • include = to have in it
  • motorway = a very wide road that cars use to travel fast and over long distances
  • release = something that is new
  • topic = subject
  • virtual = on a computer and not in the real world
  • wide = very many different kinds of